A Card Study of Sorts

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I received Steve Bright’s Spirit Within Tarot today. I don’t think I’ve bought a Schiffer deck since they used to package them in the huge, long boxes. (Oops, someone reminded me that the Ostara Tarot is also published by Schiffer and I just got that. It has these horrible cardboard bumpers that fall about when taking the deck in and out of the double well in the box.) I much prefer the way this deck came in a deep box with a ribbon tab for opening, and the cards secure inside with no funny wells or wells that have removable card around them, thank goodness. I also like the layout in the book and the colour thumbnails of the cards.

I took them to the dining table so I could really spread out and sort them into piles and then put the cards together for a draw.

THE HIGH PRIESTESS

Oh she looks so pulled together and analytic here, and yet there is a screen and water behind her. Perhaps when you really tune in it’s better than mental analysis because you simply know, the screen becomes lacy, you can smell the water, feel?

I decided to root around in my postcard boxes and came up with a small notecard, almost the same size of the card, that went with the card in my mind. Shells and water and hidden aspects, the nacre on the inside peeking out, smooth and polished, hints and tints of colour like you might see through a screen.

If you feel something is wrong or a person is not right, then pay attention. I also think of inner thoughts, protecting them, staying unto myself for a bit might be called for.

“Not all battles are won through force”, I like that. Serene is the way.

Notice how well my scans are showing the dinged corners on these cards?

THE HIGH PRIESTESS

I tried her with a lime green swirl but she found that she couldn’t concentrate, so I switched to a mint colour. Minty fresh, that’s the best.

She is holding Persephone’s pomegranate and contemplating the approaching cold weather. I’m wondering if I’m ever going to stop feeling pain day and night. Her nod suggests I should look within for healing answers and stop eating frozen yogurt which causes my right knee to swell up.

“Take a hint Jude” she says. I am not trusting the Universe. Never mind the subconscious, look at the dinged corners of the soul, the ones that you keep bashing about, knocking into the same objects over and over.

In the Tarot Wayang, Saraswati is associated with the Moon and changes, replacement, addition, subtraction and “inconstantly” which seem like words associated with the Moon and the intuitive qualities of The High Priestess.

The Hermit looks a tad unbalanced as if his feet were hurting or perhaps frozen and inflexible for walking. If you can see ahead of you, with lamp light or the light of the Moon, but your feet aren’t working, perhaps it’s a good day to rest? Or maybe your feet hurt but you carry on following where the light leads?

The wisdom to know: addition, subtraction black or white, things are either this or that, but really it’s all the same. The moon is the moon whether it’s going through a phase where you see a quarter of it or the full moon. “Every extreme carries its opposite embedded in it” says James Ricklef.

I like that idea, as if within joy you carry sadness, within depression you carry the ability to be energized and work and be happy. The Hermit goes within and it’s not loneliness it’s solitude, which also carries expansiveness. I think that’s the idea today, that duality is only a feeling and the whole thing is with you all the time.

I ordered the natural history deck I wanted. 100 large cards, filled with delightful information and clear photographs—can’t beat that. Wonder of wonders, they had the Papo brand fox I’ve been wanting for months since I got the Badgers Forest Tarot, so I ordered that too for $6.95.

11 – HIGH PRIESTESS
Swan

The swan knows! The second swan I’ve pulled in a week. Intuition is like ripples on water when the swan is swimming. White for femininity and purity (no swearing today) and water for depths of the mind and intuition.

I have not had a great week; I’m still awfully sore from the fall I took and neither my husband nor I are in a good mood. We skulk about, avoiding each other. Yesterday I could hardly speak I felt so worn out.

Nir Felder, American jazz guitarist, has crossed my mind several times on the radio with a new song called Lights from his album Golden Age.

There you go. It’s a sad little song, full of historical clips of political speeches from the 1980s and early 1990s. Was it really a golden age? Nope.

“One message that echoes….”

[Hillary Rodham Clinton 1995]

8 – EFFORT (8 of Pentacles)
II – INTUITION (High Priestess)

As much as I love the illustrations by Eric Hotz for The Bright Idea Deck, I was disappointed that Mark McElroy hooked himself into the original ideas of Roger von Oech; it’s too close for comfort to me. Also, heaven forbid one should actually state that the Effort card is really the 8 of Pentacles. That’s not good for big business selling, the marketing boys won’t like it.

I consider the 8 one of my personal cards since creativity and art is a big thing for me. However, you have to put the effort in and I’ve been quite joyous the last week organizing the last of my art materials and cementing some ideas for the two opening pages of my Chilean journal. I have to watch myself and edit down what could end up a jumbled mess.

Mark says “identifying what’s needed to get something done” and “isolating yourself to focus on the work that needs to be done.” During the winter I was quite focused on a forum for sewing and knitting, but I find myself drifting back to art and natural history now that Spring is here. That’s okay to do, it’s a cycle like a season.

The High Priestess is here to tell me that such reflection is natural. Mark refers to “the excitement of the unknown” which I find is a definite Spring feeling. Hunches and urges, the sense of what could be ties in perfectly to my art journal.

One message, that echoes in the awakening Spring, the pull of intuition as the robins pull on worms in the lawn, the urge to examine and draw and put things together in your own way, sensing.

We are getting a snow storm today, but it seems to be settling down although the wind is really high. Yesterday it was nice and I was able to get out and replenish some crucial health supplements. I also managed to replace my rotary cutter ruler at a 50% off sale. My old one was held together with packing tape—not ideal for accurate measurement. I also got some cotton thread on sale, so instead of paying $4 per spool it only cost me $2.

II THE HIGH PRIESTESS
KING OF WANDS

These are from the Secret Tarot, one of my all-time favourite decks and the 12th deck I bought about 10 years ago.

I am so NOT a High Priestess type. Seeing her (she flipped out of the deck while I was dealing), I think it might be a “keeping things close to the chest” sort of day. She knows things but doesn’t tell. Think of dreams and the unconscious, the secret knowing, feeling your way with intuition.

The King of Wands is not my favourite as I associate him with a long-ago tarot acquaintance who was unpleasant. However, he also represents confidence and will, two things I lack lately. Any sort of fire I lack, I feel like I’m going uphill all the time. Plodding along following the odd impulse here and there.

I get the feeling that he’s telling me to just do things, no matter how I feel. It is true that sometimes if you act “as if,” the act generates the feeling you want. He is sternly telling me that today.

Perhaps that universal truth is what the HP is telling me about black and white opposites and choices too. Her robe forms an X which suggests crossroads or crossing polarities, switching things up, like moods and energies.

Boy, did I have the night from hell. Excruciating pain and cramps all the way down from my hip, into my knee, and into the foot and ankle. My knee was popping and the whole leg seemed to be twisting in spasm. So I watched a bit of television at 5 a.m. and came across a guy on PBS talking about back pain. I looked up his book and came across another book which I have put on my wish list.

When I went back to bed I did some stretching and when I lay down and starting getting pain I decided a mind/body approach would be better than getting tenser and tenser. So I imagined the tendon and nerves being sheathed in ice and whenever I felt like things were inflamed and twisting, instead of panic I breathed calmly and envisioned soothing things like that and kept saying an affirmation in my mind about my legs being relaxed and comfortable. I fell asleep.

Today I am taking all my supplements and drinking lots of water and stretching regularly, walking around in proper shoes, and that sort of thing.

II HIGH PRIESTESS

The High Priestess of the Mind/Body experience says rise up from the darkness into the light! The book talks about the circulation of nature which reminds me of my body’s circulation.

The perception of the subtlest of currents lends the ability to register influences that are just beneath the surface, and transform them into inner images.